Prev: tough to be a wedding photographer
Next: Panasonic: Rasberry of the month award
From: RichA on 12 Jul 2010 17:37
The terrorist-under-ever-bed style kooks in Britain still hold sway.
No wonder they won't let their citizens have guns, they'd be the first
targets!

Amateur Photographer

A rail firm has been forced into an embarrassing climbdown - and to
make an apology - after a passenger was told he faced arrest under
anti-terror laws for taking pictures on a train.

Nigel Roberts, 41, had taken photographs with his mobile phone on a
Weymouth to London train to highlight what he saw as overcrowding and
potential danger caused by heavy luggage in the aisles.

Roberts claimed that, in an emergency, passengers would not have been
able to get out of the train and he raised his concerns with a ticket
inspector, showing him the pictures he had taken.

However, the inspector said Roberts risked being arrested under anti-
terrorism legislation and threatened to call police.

The guard told Roberts that, under the Terrorism Act, he was not
allowed to take pictures on any trains.

'But this is not the case,' a South West Trains spokeswoman told
Amateur Photographer.

'This was clearly a misunderstanding. These pictures were not a threat
to the public. As far as we are concerned, people can take pictures on
our trains.'

South West Trains admitted that the train had been crowded with
people, who had been on a cruise, returning from Southampton.

The spokeswoman said the train company has now issued a written
apology to Roberts.

From: Paul Heslop on 12 Jul 2010 20:13
RichA wrote:
>
> The terrorist-under-ever-bed style kooks in Britain still hold sway.
> No wonder they won't let their citizens have guns, they'd be the first
> targets!
>
> Amateur Photographer
>
> A rail firm has been forced into an embarrassing climbdown - and to
> make an apology - after a passenger was told he faced arrest under
> anti-terror laws for taking pictures on a train.

yer a bit late, I mentioned this on friday :O)

--
Paul (we break easy)
-------------------------------------------------------
Stop and Look
http://www.geocities.com/dreamst8me/
From: Martin Brown on 13 Jul 2010 03:30
On 13/07/2010 01:13, Paul Heslop wrote:
> RichA wrote:
>>
>> The terrorist-under-ever-bed style kooks in Britain still hold sway.

Actually the UK police are pretty good about distinguishing between the
sorts of architectural photographs likely to be of use to terrorists and
random snaps. In the encounters I have had with them they have always
been professional YMMV. OTOH jobsworth private security droids deployed
with little or no training enjoy exercising their "power" over the
public and are basically clueless thugs.

These days the ubiquitous mobile phone has more than enough resolution
to do reconnaissance photography without even being noticed.

>> No wonder they won't let their citizens have guns, they'd be the first
>> targets!

It helps keep the murder rate an order of magnitude lower than in ill
disciplined trigger happy gun toting places like the USA. I have only
ever come under live fire once and that was in LA at a petrol station.
>>
>> Amateur Photographer
>>
>> A rail firm has been forced into an embarrassing climbdown - and to
>> make an apology - after a passenger was told he faced arrest under
>> anti-terror laws for taking pictures on a train.
>
> yer a bit late, I mentioned this on friday :O)

There are moronic jobsworths everywhere. But the AP story may only be a
part of the tale - if the guy was photographing parts of the train that
would be a target for sabotage then the operator might have had a point.

Remember that in the UK we have lived with the threat of US funded IRA
terrorists blowing up our shopping centres and infrastructure for over
four decades. Islamic terrorists are more willing to inflict gratuitous
civilian casualties but large bombs in our cities are not new.

BTW Yesterday was the peak of the rioting season in Northern Ireland.

Regards,
Martin Brown
From: Blue on 13 Jul 2010 03:41
RichA wrote:
> The terrorist-under-ever-bed style kooks in Britain still hold sway.
> No wonder they won't let their citizens have guns, they'd be the first
> targets!

see

Harlow Street Scene Manager
From: sutartsorric on 13 Jul 2010 07:10
On 12 July, 22:37, RichA <rander3...(a)gmail.com> wrote:

>
> 'This was clearly a misunderstanding. These pictures were not a threat
> to the public. As far as we are concerned, people can take pictures on
> our trains.'
>

This was no misunderstanding. This is the "lets pretend we dont know
the rules and impose our own" attitude that all the transport
jobsworth use initially to prevent photography.

It is only when (or if) the photographer actually challenges said
jobsworth that the management has to come out of hiding and issue the
misunderstanding statement, to head off any legal action.

For the last 10 years there has been a creeping Stalinistic tendency
from transport management to photographers at any location. They dont
want any photos taken, except for their own "rose tinted" promotional
ones.

 |  Next  |  Last
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6
Prev: tough to be a wedding photographer
Next: Panasonic: Rasberry of the month award